Florence devolved, had resigned for far other cares the sweet intercourse of thought and poetry which he once held with that first friend of his who had now become so factious a citizen. Yet it is impossible to say how much of the old feeling may still have survived in Dante's mind when, at the close of the year 1300 or beginning of 1301, it became his duty, as a faithful magistrate of the republic, to add his voice to those of his colleagues in pronouncing a sentence of banishment on the heads of both the Black and White factions, Guido Cavalcanti being included among the latter. The Florentines had been at last provoked almost to demand this course from their governors, by the discovery of a conspiracy, at the head of which was Corso Donati (while among its leading members was Simone de' Bardi, once the husband of Beatrice Portinari), for the purpose of inducing the Pope to subject the republic to a French peace-maker (Paciere), and so shamefully free it from its intestine broils. It appears therefore that the immediate cause of the exile to which both sides were subjected lay entirely with the "Black" party, the leaders of which were banished to the Castello della Pieve in the wild district of Massa Traberia, while those of the "White" faction were sent to Sarzana, probably (for more than one place bears the name) in the Genovesato. "But this party" (writes Villani) "remained a less time in exile, being recalled on account of the unhealthiness of the place, which made that Guido Cavalcanti returned with a sickness, whereof he died. And of him was a great loss; seeing that he was a man, as in philosophy, so in many things deeply versed; but therewithal too fastidious and prone to take offence."[1] His death apparently took place in 1301.
When the discords of Florence ceased, for Guido, in death, Dante also had seen their native city for the last
- ↑ "Troppo tenero e stizzoso." I judge that "tenero" here is rather to be interpreted as above than as meaning "impressionable" in love affairs, but cannot be certain.
